No Milk Today
by Lyowyn
Summary: A 9 year old Severus Snape meets an old man who might just be able to change his destiny and set him on the path to redemption. Harry Potter has an interesting conversation with a dead man's portrait. Story spanning Severus' Hogwarts years with frequent jumps to post-war Hogwarts. Eventually some slash. Weekly updates planned.
1. Chapter 1

Author's Note: I know that I should be posting on Give Me Life, but after the bit of a hiatus I've had, I'm having a really hard time getting back into that story. So, while I try to find my bearings again, I'm going to try this thing out as a little experiment. Shorter chapters than I usually do, but I'm going out on a limb and promising weekly updates. This should end up being around 10 chapters.

Disclaimer: I do not own Harry Potter or related characters and properties. I'm just having a bit of fun.

No Milk Today

Summer

-1969-

The old man's garden was a favorite for all the children of the neighborhood, and Severus was no exception. He was nine, but he was smart for his age, and he knew something that none of the other children in the village knew: the man was a wizard.

Severus stood back from the other children as the man took fresh apples from his tree to give to each one. He was telling a story about a dragon. The old man was always telling stories like that. The stupid muggles all thought that they were fairy tales of course, but Severus knew better. Severus knew that they were true- even if there hadn't been a Norwegian Ridgeback in Britain in over half a century.

He hung back still as the man finished his story and the other children left, laughing and joking with each other. It wasn't until all the other children had gone that the man finally turned to look at the sullen greasy-haired boy in the baggy second-hand clothes.

"Didn't you want your apple, young master Snape?" He asked, reaching a gnarled old hand up to pluck another from the tree. "You really should try one. They're quite good this time of year."

Severus reluctantly left the garden fence and walked over to take the apple. He took a bite with his crooked teeth, chewed and swallowed, and finally said what he'd been wanting to say every day since he had come to the garden the first time a few weeks ago- trailing unseen behind the other village children.

"I know you're a wizard."

The old man's reaction to the accusation wasn't the one Severus' had been expecting. He shrugged it off. "They're just stories I tell, master Snape. They aren't true- just stories that I make up to entertain the children." The man spoke to him like he was explaining to a small child that there was no such thing as Father Christmas. Severus wasn't swayed.

"They might not all be true," Severus said, "but I know you're a wizard anyway."

The man regarded him seriously, but there was something in the way that his eyes sparkled within the deep folds and wrinkles of the man's face that made Severus think that he was really amused.

"And what," the man asks, "has so firmly set such a silly notion to work in your mind, might I ask?"

This is what Severus had been hoping for, and he brightened. He always liked to show adults how clever he was. "This," he said, pointing to a purple flower near the fence. "This is aconite."

"Very good," the man praised, still not looking convinced.

"And that over there," he pointed to a blood-red flower near the cobblestone path leading up to the old man's cottage. "That's flowering dragon lotus."

"Correct again."

"Mugwort and wormwood over there," he pointed to one of the shadows near the garden shed. "And _asphodel_." His eyes widened in excitement. "Asphodel right out where anyone can see it."

The old man smiled. "I'm impressed with your knowledge of botany, master Snape, but I fail to see what it has to do with why you seem to think I'm some kind of magician."

Severus scowled. Even at this age, he was quite good at it. "Not a magician," he spat the word out with disgust, "a wizard. And it isn't botany either; it's herbology. And I _know_ you're a wizard, because no muggle would plant wormwood and asphodel in their back garden."

"Maybe I just like the way they look."

"Or maybe," Snape said mockingly, "you're going to chop them up into potion ingredients and brew the _draught of living death_."

The man smiled. "I have half a mind to chop _you_ up into potion ingredients, you precocious little brat."

Severus was pretty sure the man was joking.

The old man chuckled at the look of near terror on Severus' face. "Well, come along," he said, gesturing to the door of his little cottage. "You'd better come inside and have a cup of tea while I read you the Statute of Secrecy."

The boy followed him into the cottage with hardly a second thought, and looked around with deep interest.

This definitely wasn't the house of a muggle. Growing up in a household where magic was almost scorned, Severus thought he had never seen anything as blatantly magical as the old man's home.

A broomstick sat on a small worktable at one end of the kitchen, though the old man hardly looked capable of riding it. The rest of the table was covered with miscellaneous Quidditch gear, and a broken snitch lay in pieces on a black cloth. There were spell books and robes littered around haphazardly, and a small cauldron hung on a hook near the fireplace.

"Your mother is Eileen Prince, is she not?" the old man asked. "You have her look about you."

Severus, who had never been told that he resembled anyone but his father, only nodded, not taking his eyes from the potion ingredients hung to dry from the rafters in the kitchen.

"I'll just floo her to come collect you then," the old man said, starting toward the hearth.

"We aren't on the network," Severus quickly answered. "My father is a muggle, and he doesn't really approve of magic."

The old man raised one shaggy grey eyebrow at this, but made no comment. "Is your father home this afternoon?"

Severus shook his head.

"Wonderful." The old man took his wand from somewhere within the folds of his rough spun work shirt, and something ghostly-white erupted from the tip.

It capered around the enclosed space of the cottage's main room and when it turned to face its master, Severus saw that it was a large antlered deer.

"Miss Eileen Snape, you may come to fetch your son at your leisure. I think you know where you'll find him," he spoke to the animal, and it disappeared.

"What spell was that?" Severus asked when the hart had gone.

"It's called a patronus," the old man answered.

Severus' eyes widened. "I thought they were fighting off dementors."

"Primarily, though they have a few other uses- including a means of sending a message to your mother without leaving some evidence to get her into trouble with your father later on."

"Can you teach me?"

"Perhaps one day, when you've earned your wand." The old man moved to the kitchen and set the kettle on the stove. "We'll just have a cup of tea while we wait for your mother. I have no doubt she'll be along shortly," he said as he returned to the sitting room.

"Are you a Potion Master?" Severus asked, touching the edge of the cauldron in the corner. "You must be if you have asphodel. It's only used for the draught of living death, and you'd have to be a Potion Master to be able to brew that."

The man shook his head. "Unfortunately, I do not have that particular title, though I did take my N.E.W.T. levels in Potions. I did fairly well too; I had a good teacher. But no, I am not a Potion Master, I didn't plant the asphodel, it was there when I moved in, and no decent wizard would brew the draught of living death in any case."

"Oh," Severus seemed disappointed with this answer. "So what do you do then?"

"I tend my garden and tell the children stories to entertain them."

"Well, yeah, but you're a wizard. What do you really do?"

"I'm retired."

Severus rolled his eyes. "Before that."

"Before that?" the man considered his answer for a long time. "I suppose you could say that I was involved in Defense Against the Dark Arts."

"Like an Auror?"

"No, master Snape, not at all like an Auror," the man snapped. "I have neither the time nor the patience to deal with the _Ministry of Magic_."

"A teacher then?" Severus asked.

"I have taught before, yes."

Severus' heart soared at this- imaginings of castles full of books, and magic, and adventure.

"Will you teach me something?" the boy asked. "My mother lets me help her with her brewing sometimes, when father is away."

The old man made a thoughtful noise. "Has your magical ability manifested itself already then?"

"Manifested?" Severus asked, turning the unfamiliar word over in his mouth.

"Yes, manifested, Mr. Snape. In this case, it means to make its presence known through a physical demonstration- to appear, as it were. Have you done some magic accidentally when you were in a heightened emotional state? When you were upset or angry or worried? When you were happy? Most witches and wizards show their magical ability around eight or nine. This is why they start Hogwarts at the age of eleven."

"Oh yes," Severus nodded. "I can do other things too. When I'm trying, I mean, if I concentrate."

"What sorts of things?"

Severus shrugged. "Move objects from one end of the room to the other, light candles, little things like that."

"Interesting." The man nodded. He looked the boy over appraisingly. "Perhaps I may have some use for you, after all."

There was a knock on the door then, and the old man answered the door to find boy's mother standing on the stoop. She really did have a similar look to her son, but where the boy's features looked awkward and oversized, the woman's dark hair and eyes, and the large nose, coupled with her height and slender figure gave her a look of nobility.

"Mrs. Snape," the old man greeted, ushering her in. "Thank you for coming."

She nodded briskly. "I hope that Severus hasn't been a bother."

"Oh, not at all," the old man smiled warmly. "Your boy is very sharp."

She gave the boy in question a piercing gaze. "That does not save him from being tiresome."

"On the contrary, Severus has been a delight." The kettle began to whistle then. "Ah, perfect timing! Do stay for tea, won't you?"

"Certainly." She took a seat on the sofa beside her son. Her cold visage looked almost comically out of place in the warm little cottage.

The old man busied himself with making tea- putting three teacups and some biscuits on a tray with the pot. "Do you know what mint looks like, master Snape? A friend of mine favors it in his tea, and I've developed a taste for it myself. There is some growing near the garden shed. Would you be so kind as to fetch a sprig for me?"

Severus nodded. "I like it too."

"Two sprigs then." The old man smiled, and the boy hurried off diligently.

The man set the tea tray down on the table and took a seat to Eileen Snape's right hand. He poured the tea and handed a cup to the handsome woman.

"From what I've observed and gleaned from Severus, I've learned something of the situation with your husband."

Eileen opened her mouth to protest, but the man held up a hand to forestall her.

"I'm not judging. I merely hope that I might offer a mutually beneficial solution," the old man said in answer to her objections. "Your son has expressed some desire to learn magic. And, as I grow older, I begin to regret my choice never to have children. I have no one to pass my knowledge down to. It seems like only yesterday I was a young man." He let out a little laugh. "And now I grow so old in my dotage that, the truth is, I could use a bit of help here and there. With your blessing, and the boy's consent of course, I would like to take Severus on as my apprentice. I would have someone to teach the things I've learned, of course, and some well needed help, and Severus would have something to occupy his inquisitive nature, while you would be saved the trouble of hiding such things from your brutish husband. So, you see," the man spread his hands, "mutually beneficial."

The woman's face had grown stern while the old man explained his proposal. She sipped her tea now. "I'm sorry, Mr….?"

"Peverell," the old man answered.

Her eyes widened at this. "I thought all the Peverells were dead."

The man favored her with a bitter smile. "I have the unhappy distinction of being the last," he explained, "and, as you can see, I'm still hanging on."

Eileen made no reply to this. "Mr. Peverell, I do not know you. You must surely understand how I cannot entrust the care of my only child to a complete stranger, however distinguished a line he claims to come from."

"As you say," the man answered, unperturbed, "but wouldn't it be preferable to know where he is and what he's up to than to have him wandering untended about the village. I may be doggedly old, but I do still remember what it's like to be a young boy."

She sighed. "I tell him to let me know where he's going, but nothing I do seems to stop him from doing as he pleases."

The old man nodded, smiling. "I'm sorry to say that I was much the same."

Eileen frowned but nodded. "Very well, Mr. Peverell, but I want him home before three o'clock every day, and only during the week- no weekends. If Severus agrees, of course."

"If I agree to what?" Severus asked, returning with the mint.

The man took the sprig of mint from him and crushed it between his gnarled arthritic fingers before dropping it into his cup.

"I'd like to offer you a job," he said finally. "I need someone to help me with my work- a sort of apprenticeship. I would pay you, or course, and teach you some of what I know."

Severus' eyes brightened with excitement and even Eileen seemed to lose her remaining reluctance at the mention of payment.

"I'll take it," Severus agreed. "The job, that is. Thank you, sir."

"Excellent," the old man clapped his hands together once. "I'll want you here at nine tomorrow morning. If that's all right with you, Madam?"

Eileen inclined her head. "Yes, that will be fine. Now, come along Severus. I thank you for your hospitality, Mr. Peverell, but we really must be going now."

"It was a pleasure meeting you, Mrs. Snape, and I'll be seeing you tomorrow, Severus," the old man said, still smiling.

Eileen wrapped one hand delicately over her son's shoulder, and they disapparated with a little pop of displaced air, leaving the old man once again alone.

He sat there for a moment, staring at the spot they had been occupying a moment before. Then he pulled his pocket watch from his trousers and glanced at it. The numerous whirling dials and spinning symbols would have meant nothing to anyone else, but the man replaced the watch with a muttering of, "Never enough time," and hurried to change before he missed his appointment.

oOoOoOo

It was a much younger man who apparated directly into Albus Dumbledore's office.

Dumbledore's eyes widened as he looked up from the tea service he'd been arranging in anticipation of his guest's arrival. "Why, Mr. Peverell, how very peculiar," he said by means of greeting.

"Weren't you expecting me, Albus?" he asked, glancing at the tea and biscuits.

"Of course, my_ dear_ man," Albus smiled, eyes twinkling, "but most people do not simply apparate into the office of the headmaster of Hogwarts. You'll have to forgive my surprise."

The man calling himself Peverell forced a smile. He's been trying desperately to ignore the fact that Albus Dumbledore has been flirting with him since he first made contact with the man some months before. The more time they've spent together, the harder this has become to achieve, and he can think of few things more unsettling than _that_. "Hogwarts has a bit of a soft spot where I'm concerned. I've not had any trouble with the wards in quite some time."

"Hmm," Albus made a thoughtful noise in the bottom of his throat and began pouring them tea.

"You seem to be settling in," Peverell said, glancing speculatively around the office as he accepted his cup.

"Yes," Albus agreed, "Headmaster Dippet has been threatening retirement for so long I'd never thought he'd actually do it, but I feel the position suits me."

Peverell smiled. "I would agree."

There was a high tuneful cry as a mass of red and gold came careening in through the open window and landed in Peverell's lap.

"Ah, there's my boy," Peverell said, scratching the phoenix affectionately on the head. The bird made a happy cooing noise.

"Fawkes certainly seems to have taken a liking to you," Albus observed.

"Phoenixes have a long ranging existence, they experience things differently than people do; they have long lives, and even longer memories," Peverell said. "At one point he belonged to me- in so far as such an animal may belong to anyone other than himself."

Albus' eyes lit. "So you are a _traveler_ then," he said the words with a certain reverence.

Peverell nodded with seeming reluctance. This was all part of his ultimate endgame. He had to give away just enough to get Albus to go along with whatever he asked without giving away any of his true intentions.

"I must admit that I had suspected as much," Albus looked almost gleeful at this new turn of events. "I always thought that the name Peverell was a bit too old for a man of your years. If you were sixty years older perhaps, but a man in his late thirties claiming the name Peverell must either be lying or have a more interesting story than he's letting on. I'd have known if you were simply lying, so you must have travelled here from the past. But please, won't you tell me what your first name is? I think we're passed surnames by now, wouldn't you agree?"

Peverell sipped at his tea, trying to hide a smile. "Would you like me to lie to you, Albus? I could make something up for proprieties sake I suppose."

Albus only smiled. "Oh, that won't be necessary. But on to another mystery, how is your little project coming along?"

"Well, I've secured the apprentice that I wanted. I have to say that I'm impressed by both his abilities and his… how should I say…_malleability_? I had expected to have a lot of work ahead of me- many firmly set ideas I'd need to coax out of him. I'm happy to find him so receptive. It makes my plans much simpler."

"And what exactly might those be?"

Peverell shrugged enigmatically.

"You know," Dumbledore said, "they've restricted the use of time-turners now. Too many people messing about was starting to have an effect on the time line. There are no more _travelers_. The Department of Mysteries has been tracking down anyone using a time turner and returning them to their proper time."

"Ah," Peverell said. "That's the funny thing about time travel, Albus. It's not easy to track."

"I could turn you in."

"Oh, you wouldn't do that, Albus."

"And why shouldn't I? Changing the future can have disastrous effects."

"You won't because you enjoy these conversations as much as I do, and you'd miss me if I was suddenly sent back to my own time. Also, you know as well as I do that any events that would drastically change the timeline have a way of making themselves _unchangeable_. And while the vast majority of what we think of as the major turning points in our lives have no historical significance whatsoever, those few events that do, even something so inconsequential as a trip to the zoo, or arriving a few minutes too late to catch a train, are more or less set in stone. Anything that must happen inevitably _does_ happen, and there's nothing at all we can do to stop it- whether we have the ability to travel through time or not. Nature has her own ways of preventing paradoxes, as you know quite well."

Albus studied him for a long time, and then finally he took a sip of his tea and said, "You know about Gellert."

"How many times did you try to change his path before you finally gave up?"

"Seven," he said, sipping his tea again and adopting an air of nonchalance that was so obviously feigned that Peverell nearly let the subject drop entirely to save Albus the discomfort of rehashing old regrets.

"It's quite likely that my efforts here will be in vain as well, but you must surely understand why I have to at least try."

"That's where this boy comes in then?" Albus asked. "You're trying to do for him what I was trying to do for Gellert."

Peverell nodded. "But for entirely different reasons."

Dumbledore raised an eyebrow. "And you want my help?"

"From time to time I may ask the odd favor. Nothing that would overstretch the boundaries of what one friend may freely ask from another."

"And in return, I might expect you to continue to drop in for tea when it suits our schedules?"

Peverell raised his cup in a salute.

-October 2002-

Harry Potter tucked his time turner back into his robes and slumped into his desk chair- already an old man at twenty and the youngest headmaster Hogwarts had ever seen, he was beginning to look distinctly careworn around the edges. He pulled a bottle of scotch from the bottom drawer of his desk, poured a generous amount, and began nursing the first glass of the night. Fawkes ruffled his feathers from his perch in the corner.

"I know you're awake," Harry said to the empty room- seemingly addressing thin air.

There was a derisive snort from the portrait directly behind him.

"You know you _can_ talk to me," Harry said, "I don't mind."

"I have no interest in indulging you in your self-pity, Potter," the portrait replied.

"You're hanging in here to advise your successors, not insult them," Harry said, draining his glass and filling it again from the bottle of Glenlivit that sat on his desk.

"Then I'll offer some advice. If you're feeling sorry for yourself, do what everyone else does and go out and find something pretty to shag and forget about it for a few hours. Or at least find somewhere else to mope."

Harry turned in his chair to regard the portrait of Severus Snape- given the place of honor on his cluttered wall.

"I happen to prefer _this_," he held up his glass. "And since this is _my_ office, I don't have to go anywhere. If I'm bothering you, you're free to go skulk about the dungeon like you do whenever I'm not here anyway."

"What I do with my free time is no concern of yours, and if you insist on seeking me for advice, then why don't we talk about what really has you sitting at your desk drinking scotch in the dark at two in the morning. I find it peculiar that you insist on spending your every waking moment fixated on this half-baked scheme of yours to save my life, and yet you refuse to talk to me about it."

"Yeah, but you're not _you_," Harry insisted. "You're just a portrait, a shadow of a man, not the man himself."

The portrait of Severus Snape snorted. "Your point isn't completely invalid. However, the Severus Snape you spent your afternoon with is no more your beloved dungeon bat than I am. Surely the boy barely even resembles the man you knew. So, I'm afraid, _little Headmaster_, I am the best you can do. At least I'm a reasonable facsimile."

He paused then, considering that. "I could refer to myself in the third person if you think it would make you more comfortable." When Harry didn't respond, he asked, "Did you love him?"

Harry spat scotch across his desk and turned back again to glare at the smugly smirking portrait. "Did you breathe in a few too many fumes the day they painted you?"

"Portraits don't breathe, Headmaster. Answer the question."

"How could I possibly _love_ him? He hated me. Anyway, he's dead now, so what does it matter."

"You don't stop loving someone just because they're dead, and you've been trying quite desperately to remedy that little setback."

"That doesn't change the fact that he hated my guts and did everything in his power to make my life a living hell while I was at school."

Severus snorted. "Don't sound like such a petulant child. I was _trying _to protect you- even as you did everything in your power to make that impossible."

Harry tried a smirk on for size. "What happened to talking in the third person?"

"I often find it difficult to be objective where you're concerned."

Harry filled his glass for the third time while he considered that answer. "Are you trying to say that you were in love with me? Because, I'm finding that just a little hard to believe."

"I always had very strong feelings for you. I'm not saying that they were necessarily positive feelings, but your involvement in any situation made it difficult to ignore my emotions in favor of clear thinking."

"What are you trying to say?" Harry asked, giving him a puzzled look.

"Just that, given time and world enough to try, things may have turned out differently."

"You can be one cryptic bastard, Snape. Do you have any idea how infuriating that can be?"

The portrait smirked, and, if he didn't have the scotch to blame, he would have sworn he'd seen Snape's dark eyes twinkle. "I have an inkling."


	2. Chapter 2

Author's Note: The length I'm working with on these seems to be working with the schedule I've set for myself, so we'll see how this goes. Please review when you get to the end. Some feedback really helps me keep going. Thanks, and enjoy.

No Milk Today

Chapter Two

Summer

-1969-

"Bring the milk in with you," Peverell called as there was a knock on the door. After his conversation with Severus Snape's portrait, he was feeling nervous about how he should proceed with these little teaching sessions, but he had mostly managed to get himself under control before Severus arrived.

"Where do you want this," Severus asked, holding up the bottle of milk. The boy looked nervous as well, and that helped to assuage some of Harry's unease.

"I'll take it," he said, relieving Severus of his burden, and gesturing for the boy to take a seat at the kitchen table. "I was just going to make some breakfast. Have you eaten yet?"

Severus nodded. "Yes, mother made breakfast before father left for work."

"Ah, well I hope you don't mind if I have a quick bite before we get to work."

"No, sir."

"All right then." Harry smiled at him. He dished up a bowl of porridge from the pot on the gas stove and mixed in some milk. "This will give us a chance to get to know each other a little better before our focus shifts on to things academic- a little quid pro quo?"

Severus' brow furrowed in confusion. "What?"

"It means tit for tat. I will ask you a question, and then you may ask one of me. Would that be alright with you?"

Severus nodded, perhaps a bit reluctantly. "Okay."

"Your mother says that you've been wandering around the village during your afternoons. What do you do during these little excursions?"

Severus shrugged. "I don't do anything. I just walk around and think about stuff."

"What do you think about?"

Severus' lip pouted out a bit. "I thought I get to ask you a question now."

The old man smiled. "And so you do," he agreed. "My apologies, what would you like to know?"

"How old are you?"

Harry took a bite of porridge as he mulled over his answer. "Around a hundred, I should think. How old are you?"

"Nine and a half," Severus answered promptly. "Are you a very powerful wizard?"

"Most people seem to think so. Do you have any pets?"

"No, I had a kitten once, but father backed over it in the drive." Severus' expression darkened as he passed on this bit of information. "Do you like muggles?" he asked then.

"I like as many muggles as I do witches and wizards," Harry answered. "It depends on the individual. Do you go to a muggle primary school?"

"Yes. What house were you in at Hogwarts?"

"Gryffindor," Harry answered truthfully and didn't miss the momentary flicker of surprise that crossed Severus' face. "Does that bother you?" he asked.

"No," Severus answered quickly and then a bit softer, "maybe. Mother says that Gryffindors are all brash and lack subtlety and foresight."

"She's not entirely wrong," Harry allowed, "but children are sorted into their houses when they begin Hogwarts at the age of eleven. Most people change over the course of their lives- sometimes drastically. I've met very few wizards who do not change as adults from who they were as children. And not everyone fits easily into one category." This seemed to assuage some of Severus' apprehension. "Did you have another question?"

"What happened to your wife?" he asked.

"I've never had a wife," Harry said, a bit surprised by the question. Though, perhaps he shouldn't have been. Most children have a fairly narrow view of social norms, and for all his intelligence, this Severus was still a child.

"Why not?" Severus pressed.

Harry might have pointed out that it wasn't Severus' turn to ask a question, but allowed for the boy's curiosity. "I've never been in love."

"You don't have to be in love to be married," Severus said, as though he were the one talking to a child."

"I don't suppose you do," Harry agreed, "but I don't imagine that being married to someone that you don't love makes for a very happy marriage."

"No," Severus said. "I'm never getting married."

Harry smiled sadly at him. "That's what all little boys say."

"That doesn't mean it isn't true."

"No, but someday you might change your mind."

Severus snorted a very derisive Snapeish snort, and Harry had to smile.

"That's enough of this for today, I think," Harry said, finishing off his porridge and rinsing the dish in the sink. "It's time we got to work."

"What are we going to do today?"

"What would you like to do today?" Harry asked, leaning against the counter and appraising the boy.

Severus looked around the room until his gaze fell on the cauldron by the fireplace. "Could we brew a potion?" he asked hopefully.

Harry nodded. "You've brewed with your mother?" he asked, though Severus had already told him as much.

Severus nodded.

"Alright, I have a few things that I need to brew. Do you think you can prepare some ingredients for me?"

oOoOoOo

By the time Severus left at 2:30 that day, Harry was exhausted. He needed to refresh his stores of aging and de-aging potions, and he'd thought that he would be safe enough having Severus help to prepare the ingredients for these. Traditional aging potions worked similarly to the polyjuice potion; it would wear off after a set period of time based on the potency of the brew. Harry didn't want to run the risk of being unable or forgetting to take a dose of the potion and reverting to his natural age at an inopportune time, so he and Hermione had spent a few months reworking the potion to make it permanent until the antidote was taken. The recipe of the original potion had been so altered to achieve this, many of the ingredients changed, that Harry had assumed he would be safe having Severus help him with it without giving himself away. He may have underestimated Severus' potions knowledge.

And so, Harry had spent most of the day dodging Severus' questions and cursing his own short-sightedness. By the end of the day, Harry was pretty sure that Severus was convinced that his new mentor was senile, trying to create a potion to make himself young again (technically true), or both. Whatever Severus thought, Harry did not feel as though he'd made the best impression. Harry didn't know how to answer Severus' insightful questions and had managed only vague misdirection.

The end result of all of this was that Harry would have to brew his aging potions by himself in the future and find something else for Severus to work on. For now, Harry was almost glad that the boy had gone home to his cowardly mother and abusive father. Perhaps it was selfish, but Harry really just wanted to be twenty again, at least for a few hours. The aging potion didn't just make him look like he was a hundred years old; it made him feel a hundred years old, and between the arthritis in his hands and how badly his back ached from being hunched over a cauldron for most of the day, Harry just wanted to drink his antidote potion and then maybe two or three glasses of scotch.

He sighed and rubbed at his old eyes behind his frankly inadequate spectacles and forced himself to get up on his aching old legs and go to the cabinet where he kept his potions. As he downed the vial, his relief was immediate. All of his aches and pains disappeared instantly, and the fatigue that had been plaguing him all day eased into a barely noticeable sense that bedtime may be approaching sometime in the not too distant future. He stretched his lean fit body, reveling in the joy of being twenty for just a moment. He stripped off his robes. He'd been wearing them comfortably all day, but now they were drowning him and floating a couple inches above his ankles simultaneously. He changed into a set of his normal robes and pulled the time turner around his neck out from under them.

He twiddled the time turner between his hands. It had been another of Hermione's ideas: another variation. It was fixed to two separate locations- one here in his cottage in 1969, and the other back in his office at Hogwarts in 2002. It stored this information and maintained the two separate timelines, so that every time he used it, he would be sent back to the point he'd come from in either place. Finally, he flipped a few of the dials along the top to set it and spun the tiny hourglass.

-October 2002-

Harry slumped into his desk and wasted no time in pouring a drink.

"How long were you gone this time?" a voice drawled behind him.

"Just for the day," Harry answered. "I don't think I could've taken much more than that. You were a really infuriating child, you know that?"

"All children are infuriating," the portrait responded. "You most especially so, if you'll recall."

"Oh, I wasn't that bad." Harry turned to look at him. Severus was painted in all his glory- robes fluttering out dramatically behind him in an imaginary wind. His usual scowl was absent this evening though, instead he had an uncharacteristically thoughtful look. "Do you remember me teaching you potions today, or I guess it would have been, what_, _thirty-three years ago?"

"Teaching may be a bit of a stretch, but, yes, I remember."

Harry sipped his drink. "What do you actually think about all this? I'm not sure that I ever actually asked you."

"You didn't," Severus said. "I'm not entirely sure that I have an opinion about any of this."

Harry snorted. "You always have an opinion about everything."

The portrait sighed. "Objectively, I think that you're wasting your time. This is a very long-term endeavor you're undertaking, and I don't think that you've considered all the possible ramifications. You intend to be a part of my life all through my Hogwarts years, correct?"

"That's the plan."

"So, even if you discount the times while I'm at school, you're talking about an investment of five years. All during that time, you'll be living simultaneously in two separate timelines. Just because you're living in the seventies doesn't mean that you'll cease to age. That means that if you continue on the schedule you've been on, splitting your time equally, when you reach your twenty-fifth birthday, you'll actually be thirty years old. By the time I have graduated from Hogwarts, you'll need to continue to go back to ensure that you haven't altered the timeline enough to allow for Voldemort to rise to power, or your own death, or any number of other consequences from your meddling. That, of course, is if this even works at all. I think it just as likely that I'll be drawn into Voldemort's inner circle regardless of your attempted intervention, and things will play out as they did before."

"Thanks for the vote of confidence," Harry said. He finished off and refilled his glass.

"You're becoming an alcoholic."

Harry shot him a glare. "You should judge. Who do you suppose cleaned out this office after you died? The number of empty bottles that I had to get rid of when I moved in could have come out of an Irish pub on Saint Patrick's day."

"Then you should believe me when I say that the answer to your problems isn't in the bottom of a bottle."

"I never thought it was." Harry sipped his drink. "I'm coping, Snape. The last few years have been… difficult. If I need a drink or two to forget and relax enough to get some sleep, then that's my business. Since when are you concerned anyway?"

"What have I ever done to make you think that I wasn't concerned about your wellbeing?"

Harry toyed with the glass in his hands and looked up at him, speaking reluctantly what was on his mind. "That thing you said last night, about how things might have been different, it's been bothering me. What exactly did you mean by that?"

"Wouldn't you consider this conversation a sharp turn from our prior interactions?"

"Yes, I suppose, but it's not the same. You're not even really Snape, and I'm older now. I don't let you intimidate me."

"The only reason I don't intimidate you is that I'm not the real Severus Snape; I'm a square of enchanted paint and canvas. But, that's beside the point. You are older now, and our positions have changed. If I had lived and we had been given opportunity to have some kind of interaction with each other as adult equals without any agenda, I imagine it would have been much like this. Perhaps we even could have been friends."

Harry drained his glass before he could muster the courage to ask, "Or more?"

The portrait smirked playfully as his gaze scanned Harry up and down, "Perhaps. Are you ready to admit that that is what you really want? That it is the real reason why you're doing any of this?"

Harry looked at him for a very long time, not saying anything. The truth was, he didn't know why he felt so compelled to try to save Snape. After everything that had happened, Severus certainly deserved another chance- a chance to live his life free of obligations, answerable only to himself. But, that didn't mean that there weren't plenty of other people who deserved the same. He could attempt to save Cedric, or Fred, or the Lupins, or any number of others, but somehow that just didn't feel right. Deep down, he knew that it wouldn't work. Even with all evidence to the contrary, he really thought that this would. He just knew that he wasn't wasting his time with Severus. But, did he have an ulterior motive? It was possible. If he hadn't at least been thinking about it, they wouldn't be having this conversation. If everything went to plan and they were both still alive at the end of all this, then maybe there could be something more to their relationship.

"I don't know," Harry admitted finally, "maybe. I hadn't really even considered it until you suggested it, but I wouldn't be completely against the idea if that's how things work out."

Severus raised an eyebrow. "There are easier ways to go about finding a lover, and I'm certain that you could find one much more agreeable than me."

"I've tried that. It didn't work out."

"Oh, to be certain, I couldn't have missed the parade of men to come through that door since you broke things off with Ms. Weasley."

"Anyway, I never actually said that I wanted… well, _you_. I just guess I want the option. Maybe you're right, things could have turned out differently, but unless you're alive we'll never find out."

"As you say, but I wouldn't suggest waiting around to find out. You're young; you should live your life for yourself. Don't waste it in service to a dead man. Whatever you think you owe me, let it go."

Harry rose from his desk. "How exactly do you think I can do that- with you hanging there scowling at me every day? How can I live with that constant reminder of everything I can't have, knowing that I could do something about it?"

"I thought you weren't sure about what you wanted."

Harry ran his hand through his hair. "I'm not. I'm going to bed." He went through his office into his private quarters without giving Severus another glance. He went into his room, but even though he'd intended to spend the night here, he didn't climb into bed; instead he pulled the time turner out and spun it back to the sixties.

-1969-

Harry woke in his little bed in his cottage. He panicked for a moment when he realized how late it was. Severus could be there at any moment, and he still looked twenty years old. He all but ran to his potions cupboard and downed his aging potion. The agony of instantly aging eighty years settled into his bones and left Harry gasping in pain. He followed the aging potion with a pain killer and took a seat at the kitchen table.

Severus arrived a minute or two later. "I brought in the milk," Severus said, holding up the jug. "Are you okay?" Concern lined the boys face.

Harry forced himself to smile as warmly as he could manage. "I'll be fine. I'm just a little sore. Do you think that you could make me a cup of tea?"

Severus went over to the stove. He had to stand on his tiptoes to reach the back of the range for the kettle, but he didn't seem to have too much trouble after that. In a few minutes, Harry had a hot cup of tea in his hand, and Severus was sitting across from him staring at him expectantly. Harry did his best to ignore the boy as he sipped his tea. The truth was he wasn't just sore from suddenly being old; he was also suffering from a mild hangover. Perhaps Severus' portrait had a point. Maybe he should cut back on his drinking a bit.

"Did you just wake up?" Severus asked.

Harry nodded, massaging his brow.

Severus continued to stare at him for a moment before Harry realized that the boy was waiting for him to ask a question.

"Do you have any magical portraits in your house?"

"Just one of my grandmother," Severus answered. "Father doesn't like it, but mother cries every time that he tries to take her down."

"Do you ever talk to her?"

Severus shrugged. "Not really, she naps a lot. She's always awake to tell me to tie my shoes when I walk by though. It's like she has a sixth sense for whether or not my shoes are tied."

Harry looked down at the shoes in question. One of them was indeed untied. They were in a sorry state: scuffed, coming apart at the seams, and the sole of one was coming unglued pulling apart from the bottom like a gaping mouth. Then Harry suddenly remembered why he was doing this and felt worlds better. He hadn't started this whole thing in some hope of getting a possible future Severus Snape into his bed. He'd begun this little project to help a young boy, not so unlike himself, that was being neglected and abused by his parents, that didn't have any friends, and had to walk around in broken worn out shoes that he'd probably outgrown last year.

Harry smiled at him, genuinely this time, when Severus followed his gaze and hurriedly bent to tie his shoe.

"I have a new potion for us to brew today," Harry said when Severus resurfaced from under the table. "You'll like this one."


End file.
